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New Writer Podcast Episode 25 – New Projects, Big Ideas, and the 7-Point Story Structure

This week I’d like to talk a little about my new project, the big picture concept, where I’m at on it, and some of the tools I’ve used to get there, but first, the weekly update.

This week I had 34 downloads for Choices as well as 7 total sales of other books on Amazon, netting me a grand total $12.67 for the week on Amazon and nothing on any of the other platforms. This isn’t exactly surprising considering I’ve made a grand total of about $20 on all of the other platforms combined since I started publishing in March of last year.

I’ve been doing quite a bit of writing this week, including once again experimenting with Dragon Naturally Speaking. I’ve managed to write over 15,000 words this week and I attribute that to getting back into the habit of using 750words.com

If you’re not familiar, 750words.com is a website with a similar concept as the morning pages. The idea is to write 3 pages, or 750 words, of free writing every day just to form the habit of writing and clear your mind from the clutter. What kicked me back into using it with dedication was signing up for a monthly challenge, which is a non-binding contract to write every day. When you join the challenge to set two terms, one reward you’ll give yourself if you achieve the goal of writing at least 750 words every day for a month and one if you fail.

For me, if I manage to write every day in July, I get to go see Antman, assuming, of course, it’s still in theaters two weeks after its release date. If I fail, I will donate $25 to 750words.com. The service is free and donations keep the doors open. As of recording this episode on the 10th of July, I haven’t missed a day yet and don’t intend to.

I also have been experimenting with Dragon Naturally Speaking again, which is a really weird way of writing. It takes a lot to get used to dictation, especially when you have to speak your punctuation, but I think it might be worth it. When I did my 750 words using dictation software yesterday, I was able to do it in 4 minutes. It came out to something like 183 words per minute, which is almost double my standard typing rate. If I was able to maintain that speed for an hour, it’d be 10,980 words per hour, which is just stupid insane.

So naturally, I have a new goal.

One of the things I have been doing in my 10-minute dictation word sprints is ignoring punctuation. Speaking punctuation really ruins my flow, and I’m already having a hard enough time working on fiction with my voice. It is a pretty big goal on my list, though, so I am planning to keep working at it.

Which brings me to my new project.

Since Seven Keys 5 is currently being proofread, and my outlined romance novel is possibly developing into a collaboration, I needed something completely different to work on. I decided to try my hand at another genre I love to read: Space Opera.

Now, if you follow me on Twitter or Facebook, you might have seen my word count screenshots from Scrivener calling this the Space Opera Serial, and there’s a reason for that.

I’m not planning on releasing the story in individual episodes, but I am writing it somewhat along those lines for a specific reason. I really want to do an audiobook, and I think I’d like to do it as a podiobook style, so I’m developing this story into sections based on how long the audio version of the story would be.

Right now, I’m operating under the assumed narration speed of about 125-150 words per minute, so I’m dividing the story up into 10 7,000 word episodes which should come out to roughly 50-55 minutes of audio. I also want each episode to have a set beginning, middle, and end while still filling into an overall plot for the entire set.

I haven’t decided if I will release each episode as a separate ebook, but I’m leaning against it pretty heavily. Part of the reason for that is the multiplication of t